Hot News

• The trading Volume of the Federal Funds rate market has risen to its highest level since July 2023.

The trading volume of the US federal funds rate market surged to its highest level in about a year and a half on Monday, indicating that the Federal Home Loan Banks (FHLB) are lending out excess dollars in the market. According to data released by the New York Fed on Tuesday, the trading volume in the federal funds rate market rose to 119 billion USD as of December 23, the highest level since July 2023, compared to 113 billion USD the previous trading day.

• US Treasury bonds fell across the board, with yields on long-term bonds widening the gap with short-term bonds.

USA Treasury bonds were under pressure on Tuesday, with the market closing early due to holiday factors. Investors remain cautious about purchasing 10-year or longer-term Treasury bonds. Long-term Treasury yields led the rise, further exacerbating the steepening trend of the yield curve. The benchmark 10-year Treasury yield rose by about 3 basis points to 4.62%, widening the difference with the 2-year Treasury yield to 28 basis points, close to the highest level since 2022. Trading volume was about 50% of normal levels.

• The Ministry of Finance of China stated that it will focus on expanding domestic demand in 2025, appropriately increasing the basic pension for retirees, and raising the fiscal subsidy standards for urban and rural residents' health insurance.

From December 23 to 24, the National Finance Work Conference was held in Peking. The meeting emphasized that in 2025, a more proactive fiscal policy should be implemented, maintaining strong efforts and enhancing support, playing a 'combined punch' of policies; increasing the fiscal deficit rate and arranging for a larger scale of government bonds; greatly optimizing the expenditure structure and strengthening precise investment; continuing efforts to prevent and resolve risks in key areas; enhancing local financial resources to ensure the baseline of the three guarantees at the grassroots level; raising the basic pension for urban and rural residents and increasing the fiscal subsidy standards for urban and rural residents' health insurance.

• Large banks have filed a lawsuit against the Federal Reserve citing a lack of transparency in stress tests.

The industry organization representing the largest banks in the USA filed a lawsuit against the Federal Reserve on Tuesday, accusing it of using an opaque process in its annual stress tests to evaluate banks' risk tolerance. The lawsuit states, "The lack of transparency from the Federal Reserve has led to enormous and unpredictable fluctuations in banks' capital requirements." Just a day earlier, the Federal Reserve announced plans to reform its bank stress testing system and seek public input on the proposed reform plan in early 2025. These industry organizations represent major banks including JPMorgan, Bank of America, and Citigroup.

• OpenAI is reportedly considering developing humanoid robots.

According to reports, OpenAI has re-engaged its interest in robotics over the past year: investing in startups developing robotic hardware and software, such as Figure and Physical Intelligence, and restarting its internal robotic software team that was disbanded four years ago. Now, OpenAI may elevate this interest to a new level. According to two individuals directly familiar with the discussions, the company has recently considered developing a humanoid robot. However, one of the insiders stated that any potential humanoid robot seems to be a lower priority for OpenAI compared to many of its other technologies and products.

News of individual stocks

• "The Santa Claus rally" has arrived! The Nasdaq closed up 1.35%, returning above 0.02 million points, with Tesla soaring over 7%.

The three major U.S. stock indexes all closed higher, with the Nasdaq up 1.35%, returning above 0.02 million points; the S&P 500 Index rose 1.1%, and the Dow Jones increased by 0.91%.

Large technology stocks surged across the board, with Tesla increasing over 7%, Netflix rising over 2%, and Apple, Amazon, and Meta up more than 1%. NVIDIA, Alphabet-A, Intel, and Microsoft saw slight increases. Among them, Apple continued to set new highs for three consecutive trading days, reaching a total market value of 3.9 trillion USD.

Bitcoin briefly returned above 99,000 USD, and stocks related to the crypto concept generally rose, with MicroStrategy increasing nearly 8%, Riot Platforms rising over 8%, and Bitdeer jumping nearly 15%.

China Concept Stocks showed mixed results, with the Nasdaq Golden Dragon China Index rising by 0.79%. Fangdd Network increased by over 5%, NIO and DouYu rose by over 3%, and Li Auto and XPeng Motors rose by over 1%.

• Tesla makes a big move at the end of the year! Model Y hits the lowest price in history, still in stock.

On December 24, Tesla's official website in China launched the "Purchase Stock Car, Down Payment Reduction" policy, offering a 10,000 yuan reduction on the down payment for purchasing a Model Y stock car, which can be combined with the "5 years 0 interest financing plan" valid until January 31, 2025. The Tesla official website in China shows that for the Model Y rear-wheel drive version and the long-range all-wheel drive version currently in stock, the price starts at 0.2399 million yuan, and buyers can apply for the 5 years 0 interest financing plan. This means that the monthly payment starts at just 2,667 yuan. Tesla claims that the Model Y is now available at a historical lowest price and the lowest price globally. As of Tuesday's close, Tesla surged over 7%, closing at $462.28.

• Apple seeks to defend against the billions of dollars that Google pays in the search case.

$Apple (AAPL.US)$ Has requested participation $Alphabet-A (GOOGL.US)$ In the upcoming online search antitrust trial in the USA, stating that it cannot rely on Google to uphold the revenue-sharing agreement, as Google pays this iPhone manufacturer billions of dollars each year to make Google the default search engine in the Safari browser. Apple's lawyers submitted court documents in Washington on Monday stating that regardless of whether the payments continue, Apple does not plan to establish its own search engine to compete with Google. In 2022 alone, Apple earned approximately 20 billion dollars from its agreement with Google.

• On January 6, Jensen Huang will deliver a keynote speech at CES.

$NVIDIA (NVDA.US)$ Founder Jensen Huang will speak at 6:30 PM Pacific Time on January 6, 2025, which is 10:30 AM Beijing Time on January 7, during the CES 2025 conference. NVIDIA announced that this keynote speech will be live-streamed on YouTube and the NVIDIA official website, and Huang will be 'dressed in his iconic leather jacket, with an unwavering vision.' Analysts expect Huang to announce a series of significant news at the International Consumer Electronics Show (CES) held in Las Vegas, USA, where the RTX 5000 series GPU will be the highlight of the keynote.

• The union stated that Starbucks baristas' strike will expand to 300 stores nationwide.

According to $Starbucks (SBUX.US)$ the union claims that the Starbucks baristas' strike will spread to over 300 coffee shops, affecting services in many stores across the country during the final days of the critical holiday shopping season. According to a statement via email from the Starbucks Workers Union, over 5,000 employees in cities such as Boston, New York, and Philadelphia will join the strike on Tuesday. Recently elected officials, including Pittsburgh Mayor Ed Gainey, have also joined the striking baristas, as the union calls for more support in their planned actions on the last day.

• YUM CHINA rose nearly 4%, marking the first price increase for KFC China in two years.

$Yum China (YUMC.US)$ The stock rose nearly 4%, closing at $50.42. In terms of news, YUM CHINA's fast food chainstore KFC China has initiated a price increase today, marking the first price hike for the brand in the mainland market in two years. Reports indicate that the average increase this time is around 2%, with product prices raised from 0.5 to 2 yuan, while promotional meal sets like the "Crazy Four" discount, "Crazy Day" event, OK meals, and children’s meals remain unchanged in price.

• Focusing on new growth momentum, KeyBanc raises the Target Price for Netflix to $1000.

$Netflix (NFLX.US)$ The stock price may be entering the "valuation danger zone", but KeyBanc analysts remain optimistic and have decided to raise the company's target price. On Tuesday, Netflix rose 2.27% to $932.12. Analysts led by Justin Patterson maintained a "Shareholding" rating for Netflix stocks and raised the target price from $785 to $1,000, which is 9.4% higher than the current level.

Top 20 by trading volume

Hong Kong market outlook

• The North capital invested over 0.8 billion HKD in Industrial And Commercial Bank Of China, bought over 0.3 billion HKD in CHINA MOBILE and XIAOMI, and sold over 0.6 billion HKD in MEITUAN.

On December 24th (Tuesday), due to the Christmas holiday, the Hong Kong stock market will close half a day early, with southbound funds net buying HK stocks of 5.227 billion HKD.

$ICBC (01398.HK)$ 、$CHINA MOBILE (00941.HK)$、$XIAOMI-W (01810.HK)$Net purchases were 0.862 billion HKD, 0.366 billion HKD, and 0.365 billion HKD respectively.$MEITUAN-W (03690.HK)$There was a net sale of 0.639 billion HKD.

Today's focus

Keywords: Hong Kong stocks, USA stocks, etc. will be closed all day due to Christmas; Bank of Japan Governor Ueda Kazuhiro will give a speech.

On Wednesday, the economic data regarding USA API Crude Oil Product inventory for the week ending December 20 will be released.

In terms of financial events, the Governor of Japan's Central Bank, Kazuo Ueda, will give a speech.

Additionally, the USA stock market, Hong Kong stocks, Singapore stocks, Canadian stocks, Australian stocks, and Malaysian stocks will be closed for Christmas, and the HK->SZ and SZ->SH trading will be suspended.

Futubull Morning News:

You must think independently. I am often astonished by how some highly intelligent people unconsciously follow the crowd in the market, and chatting with these people is of no benefit to me.

——Warren Buffett

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